Transpac – race day 8

Cubaneren is rageing towards Honolulu and the good old lady sat a new personal record doing 204 nautical miles last 24 hours – also assumed to be a world record for Wasa 55. An other exciting figure is also a current top speeds of 19 knots. Those of you who did the math at breakfast yesteday probably now have a post-it sticker on your refrigderator door (next to the picture postcard from L.A.) telling you we’re about 4 nautical miles behind target to beat the Cal40s – but don’t worry yet. We changed our calculator from degrees to radians and even though we only beat them by 16 miles yesterday, the math says our position is more favourable now. So keep the spirit high!

From an entertainment point of view it’s been an exciting day of sailing. We’ve spent the last 5 days pretty much alone in this big lake – but this morning one of the larger racing machines, Aszhou, decided to swing by on their way to Hawaii and give us a hand for showing them the fastest path to the islands in the west. Pretty rude to pass us on windward side, but it was only a matter of seconds before she took off and disappeared into the horizon. Also we’ve swapped from our S2 spinakker to the new S4 as the wind has been picking up. It’s red and looks exatly like the old one, so don’t tell our competitors. They will not notice! The manouver was flawless. Video evidence exists. Winning!

The crew is doing fine, and this morning was so far the best as we celebrated only 1000 nautical miles to go by having Gin & Tonics for breakfast. Corn flakes and choco pops never tasted this good.

As we’re about to complete 1900ish nautical miles on starboard tack and hence steering only using left hand this is about to make us look like Rafal Nadal at the end of his youth career when he only fed his right arm Italian beef á la Contador whilst forgetting the other.

Also, you still don’t have to worry about us getting dehydrated or sunburned now that LA reportedly experienced the hottest day registered since 1886 today. The 100% overcast is still as solid as German concrete made in the 1940s, and due to the persistence in lack of fallbacks in navigational methods if our primary systems collapse – we’ve spent some time to develop and innovate a groundbreaking way of navigating. The newly completed safety course referred to sextants, lunar measuring and even just following the airplanes. Clever?! Or not! We don’t even know where the sun rise or set, so we are now monitoring the sea temperature to map where we are and if we’re going north or south. That’s what we call clever!

And guess what!? Two more packages of bacon was found opened this morning! Monsieur Poirot was immediately contacted as this serious crime now escalated – and he was the only one NSA knew about that still does interregations via morse. And yes, in true crime style it turned out not to be the first suspect Eirik, but rather the youngest kid onboard – Thomas – who is getting sick and tired of the freeze dried food after years in the army.
And speaking of Thomas, he is about to become an expert in retirement lifestyle. His post dinner naps have become his actual bedtime, and as a result we have decided to have dinner later to keep him up.

Our great captain and leader Kim Otto Book-Ond is sleeping less, but makes sure the crew is getting Cubaneren the fastest to Hawaii by wearing less and less underwear. Luckly he has decided not to set of any of the rockets we carry to attract further attention – for now.